News Release

10/20/09 Providence Public Library Elects New Trustees at 2009 Annual Meeting

PROVIDENCE, RI -- Providence Public Library (PPL) held its 2009 Annual Meeting on October 1 at its Central Library, 150 Empire Street.  The following four Providence residents were elected to the PPL Board of Trustees:

Elizabeth Debs, a PPL Corporation member since 2006, has served as a member of the Library’s Facilities Committee.  Involved in community development for more than 20 years, Debs has had a long-term consulting relationship with the Housing Network of RI where she has been involved in the creation of a statewide Housing Land Trust and the Partnership for Community Development in conjunction with Roger Williams University.  Debs has been involved with the GrowSmart Land-Use Training Collaborative for several years and has lead in developing workshops on affordable housing design, housing land trusts/trust funds and strategies for mixed-use development.  She received her Bachelor of Arts from Vassar College and her Master’s of Architecture from the Harvard Graduate School of Design.

Nyekeh Forkpa joins the PPL Corporation as a Trustee. He is presently with Citizens Financial Group, where he is a Community Reinvestment Act Analyst.  Forkpa received his Bachelor of Science in Accounting from the University of Liberia and his Master’s in Business Administration from the University of Rhode Island.

Stephen Houston joins the PPL Corporation as a Trustee. He is a Professor of Archaeology and of Anthropology at Brown University, where he holds the Dupee Family Endowed Professorship of Social Sciences.  Professor Houston is a world-leading authority on the origins of writing and literacy and on the archaeology and art of Mesoamerica. He has recently been selected as a Fellow of the National Endowment for the Humanities, the American Philosophical Society, and the Guggenheim Foundation, and, in 2008, was selected as a MacArthur Fellow, that rarest of academic honors.

Ellen Kathleen Hayes, a PPL Corporation member since 2004, has served as a member of the Library’s Finance Committee.  Hayes has been with Textron, Inc. for 10 years serving in a number of corporate financial capacities, most recently as Director of Pension Investments.  She received her Master’s in Business Administration from the University of Chicago.  Hayes also serves as a member of the Board of The Providence Athenaeum.